


Fragile

by ixolite (ebouros)



Category: Spider-Man (Ultimateverse), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Ultimate Spider-Man (Cartoon)
Genre: Blood, Fluff, Friendship is beautiful, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Probably improbable medical stuff, Spoilers (S1E19), gentle hulk, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2019-01-10 10:53:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12297726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ebouros/pseuds/ixolite
Summary: Some sort of hurt/comfort fic taking place somewhere in Ultimate Spider-man after S1E19 ("Home Sick Hulk"), an episode in which our hero takes care of the Hulk after he gets infected by aliens. This time, it's Spidey's turn to be in trouble and his big green friend will do whatever it takes to keep him safe. An important note if you're not familiar with this cartoon: in Ultimate Spiderman, the Hulk can't turn back into Bruce Banner for an unknown reason, which is why the character is a bit different from what we're normally used to.One of the first fanfictions I ever wrote and the first one I consider decent enough to post online! (I have issues). For some reason I was just really touched by the friendship between Hulk and Spidey in that cartoon, and I wanted to elaborate on it a little more since that show isn't big on emotional depth or character development (I mean of course, it's an action cartoon).





	Fragile

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language. I try my best but you might still encounter awkward phrasing or misused words. Please don't hesitate to comment if you find mistakes!

Here you are, once again, walking the streets of New York, each and every one of your thundering footsteps making the ground tremble and shake. The other guy – Banner, the puny man you are aware of _having been_ at some point – knows that it’s exactly the kind of thing that damages roads prematurely and ends up costing cities millions of dollar every year in repairs.

Of course, since you’re there walking in the middle of the street unfettered, sending the citizens running away terrified, road damage is really the last type of collateral the city should be worrying about. On the plus side, it’s an otherwise rather pleasant evening.

You’re mean. You’re green. And boy, you’re angry.

You are the Hulk.

You are the Hulk, and something thought it was a good idea to have a swat at you while you were resting in your newest hiding place. For once, you had been relatively calm. The abandoned storage unit you had found in the sewers was dark, warm, quiet and comfortable, and when you curled up in there for a bit of shuteye, it felt safe.

It fills you with a blistering, white-hot rage to think that you could have been deprived of it by some ridiculous-looking metal crawly.

"Hulk SMASH!"

You didn’t even think about it, but there it goes: the parked minivan you blindly grabbed and threw in your anger flies in an arc in front of you and crushes a cluster of garbage cans on the side of the street in an ear-wrenching sound of broken glass and crumpled metal.

You roar in fury. People are running all over the place in complete panic, but you hardly notice them. The only thing you can focus on right now is finding the crawly and smashing it to bits. Then smash the bits to bits. Then smash a building or two real good, to let out some steam.

It has been difficult for you to find shelter since you decided to leave the big S.H.I.E.L.D. sky ship. Well, not more than before, but still. After the incident involving the puny metal creatures that took you to space and then made you sick, you had decided to join the sky people because the S.H.I.E.L.D. boss, eye patch man, said he could help you.

Your friend bug man, whom you now know is a human boy named Peter Parker under his mask, encouraged you to go. He told the one-eyed man that you used your power for good, to smash the baddies, and to you, he said that S.H.I.E.L.D. did the same thing. At first you refused to go with them, but you reconsidered: after bug man helped you in your hour of need, you decided you owed him to at least try. Plus, you were hungry.

And try you did. The sky ship they brought you to, their huge boat way up in the sky, was a bad place for you though. You had no place to move (you were too big for everything) and there were certainly no things to smash – one eyed-man said no smashing.

You wanted to comply, you really did. But it hurt when the white coat people started poking needles into you to run their tests. Eye patch man explained that it was to help you, to understand how you worked, but the needles…they were just so _maddeningly_ annoying, and by that time you hadn’t smashed anything for _days_.

After you destroyed half of the sky ship, one-eyed man and his goons tried getting you in one of those big fancy jails they have aboard it. You wouldn’t go, however. You don’t like being imprisoned. It makes your blood boil in an especially nasty kind of way. At that point, you had no other choice but to leave the sky ship.

And left you did. You jumped right off the damn thing and into the ocean; the biggest cannonball dive ever witnessed by human eyes. S.H.I.E.L.D. didn’t try to get you back. Maybe you managed to give them the slip, or maybe they just had bigger fish to fry. Either way, you could not care less.

That means you are on your own again, however, living just where you are, everywhere and nowhere at the same time, all alone. You’re not sad about it at all. The sky ship never became your home. However, finding places where you can sleep without being bothered went back to being a chore.

Which is why having been disturbed by a puny robot in the one decent spot you could find makes you so furious.

You snap out of your thoughts when you realize the robot, which you didn’t let out of your sight ever since you started chasing it, suddenly darted to the left into an alleyway. You run behind it, shoving a lamppost away from your path like a trekker in the woods would have pushed away a branch from his trail.

At the back of the alley, the robot slithers through a hole in a chain link fence. You don’t even stop to acknowledge the fence, and it breaks apart on your head and chest with a metallic clang as you charge through it.

You dash across what appears to be the empty parking lot of an abandoned factory. For good measure, you smash the concrete blocks lining the parking areas with your fists as you sprint towards your target, which remains faster than you despite all the energy you’re expanding.

The robot stops for a second in front of a decrepit factory brick wall with boarded-up windows, pausing in front of a tiny round glassy object embedded in the wall. A quick pulse of laser leaves the object and makes contact with the spherical red eye of the robot; an instant later, a small door opens in the wall, swallowing the robot and then closing hermetically behind it, almost invisible.

 You would never have noticed the glass thing or the door if you hadn’t seen them in action. It’s too late for them however; they’ve been spotted by none other than the Hulk.

 You reach the wall a second later and, growling, you put all your strength into wedging open the small door. The metal sheeting bends under your fingers like rubber. You stick your arm inside the opening and flail it about, hoping to catch yourself a handful of robot. You end up empty-handed though.

 A low rumble forms deep in your large green chest. The robot managed to escape. How _dare_ this puny metal squid disturb you for no reason, string you along across half the city and then just disappear into an ugly brick box? Does it know who you are? _What_ you are? Does it know what it just did? Clenching your jaw, your fists, your everything, you yell.

"Hulk…MAD!"

Your wrathful howl manages to make the concrete quiver. With a grunt, you give the wall the punch of a lifetime. The sheer force of the impact sends tremors into the entire structure.

The entire brick wall collapses in a cloud of dust, revealing the much tougher, much more sophisticated, high-tech looking armoured plating that was concealed underneath. Someone in there obviously doesn’t want to be bothered.

Tough luck. They just had to think about it before bothering _you_.

You sink your knuckles into the metal, twist a little, and you just, you just _pull_. An incredibly loud, sinister creaking sound fills the air as the metal resists valiantly, but ends up giving out under your monstrous strength. Once you’re done, the entire metallic wall is what you end up tossing aside.

***

The inside of the factory is completely flooded with a thick, smelly green fog that assaults you, grates your lungs and impairs your vision as you step into the room you just tore open. The building appears to be rather vast. On the walls, you distinguish the contours of elaborate machinery.

This place reminds you of eye patch man’s big sky ship, but…creepier. You didn’t know it was possible, but you like this place even less than the S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters.

You hear speech from inside the factory, and you start moving towards it blindly, protecting your face with your massive arms. Whoever is in there has to be the one that sent the robot to annoy you, and you can’t let that slide. The echoes grow closer and closer. Soon you can make out the words.

"No! Who did this? Who is disturbing my research at such an inconvenient time?"

The voice you hear has a pronounced hiss in in. You squint in a simultaneous attempt to express menace and to see more clearly what’s ahead of you.

Through the thick cloud of gas, you’re able to catch a glimpse of a rounded silhouette with long, bendy legs, whose footsteps clank metallic on the factory floor. What is this thing? It looks weirdly similar to the crawly that attacked you in the sewers. Is this the same deal as the puny metal creatures from space – a big one making all the little ones?

Finally, the cloud of gas starts clearing from the scene as fresh air floods the factory through the gaping hole you’ve created by _ripping off one of its walls_. You can finally make out what you’re up against. It’s actually just a puny human, ugly as sin, with four long, flexible metal tentacles coming out of his back, like a squid. His face is completely covered with a black gas mask.

"Now now, I’ve waited so long to find out what makes you tick, it’s such a shame we are being delayed in this way…but, I suppose it can’t be helped."

The tone is victorious, greedy, almost lustful. You don’t understand what’s going on. The puny human isn’t even looking at you.

You grit your teeth. You’re right in from of him, enormous, green and _mad_ , and it’s acting like you don’t even exist! This is making you even madder. You brutally sink your fist into the nearest machine, sending electrical sparks sputtering. Squid man finally acknowledges your presence.

"Ah, so the one making such a racket is none other than the one and only Hulk. Normally, I would have loved the opportunity to study you, but, first things first."

You’re getting confused – confused and positively livid.

"Who is squid man talking to? Squid man sent puny robot to attack the Hulk! Hulk smash squid man!"

 Squid man snickers. He seems to find that idea rather funny.

"Heavens, that was probably just one of my surveillance bots. You likely just happened to be in the way of its route…an unintentional mistake, of course. I fancy myself to be rather smart; I know better than to attack the Hulk. Now, if that was the only order of business you had with me, I would ask you to leave. I am about to conduct very important research."

As squid man speaks, the three-pronged claws at the end of two of his metallic appendages whir open. One reveals a buzz saw and the other a fork-like tool that crackles with blue electricity. You watch him, as confused as ever, as you’re trying to make heads or tails of this strange human and his strange words.

As the fog continues clearing, you notice there is a second silhouette in the scene; squid man turned away from you to face it, threatening it with his instruments.

You can now see as well that one of his claws had been busy gripping that person’s chest tightly, pinning them to a wall forcefully even though they don’t appear to be resisting at all. The person hanging there is completely motionless, which is why you didn’t notice them earlier through the fog.

That figure looks sort of familiar to you. Small, lean but muscular – you take a few steps towards it to take a better look, and as you do, your eyes finally distinguish through the green haze what seem to be red and blue hues. You frown, puzzled.

"Bug man?"

Surprised, you look more closely – yes, that’s right, that suit is bug man’s, it has the big white eyes and the web pattern and everything.

You suddenly feel like your blood just turned to ice in your veins. The lack of annoying quips and aggravating whizzing around makes that person look more like a puppet dressed like bug man than bug man himself, but it has to be him, unless someone stole his costume and decided to go get bullied by an ugly metal-legged human for some reason.

Your priorities suddenly undergo a drastic shift.

"Squid man let go of friend…or Hulk SMASH!"

You leap towards him, ready to fight, but squid man saw you coming. Holding what you think is your friend like a ragdoll with his claw, he retreats away to the back of the factory, in the deepest area that is still filled with a thick green mist.

" _Friend_? Spiderman is a scientific marvel, but still a pea-brained buffoon. I guess birds of a feather flock together."

He presses a button on a control panel and a swarm of tentacled robots dives onto you, covering his retreat. You ignore them. You surge towards squid man, irate, throwing punches blindly through the haze, destroying anything you encounter like brittle wood. Sending robots to you, messing with your friend, trash-talking, hiding in the fog…this puny human is showing you new shades of rage.

You emerge snarling from the cloud of gas in front of a frightened squid man, having utterly annihilated his swarm of robots in less time it takes to say “Hulk smash”.   

"This is impossible. How can you still be so strong? This neurotoxin gas should have put you to sleep!"

Squid man doesn’t have to wait very long for an answer.

"Hulk…MAD!"

You charge towards your adversary and hit him square in the stomach, sending him barrelling in the misty depths of the factory. You hear him crashing into something with a loud thud and a yelp.

Everything in you wants to go grab this greasy human by the collar and pummel him with your bare fists until you smash him and his whole lab into _sand_. However, the thought of bug man’s inanimate form being dragged through the lab just doesn’t allow you to do that. There is a time and place for everything. Right now, bug man needs you more.

"Bug man!"

He doesn’t answer, but it doesn’t take much looking around to find your friend sprawled on the factory floor right where squid man was when you hit him in the gut. You stick bug man under your arm and in a single, powerful jump, you break through the factory’s ceiling, land onto its roof, and flee into the night. 

***

Jumping from roof to roof, you quickly put some distance between you and squid man’s lair and then proceed to take a break on the top of a skyscraper. You lay bug man on the concrete roof of the building and take a look at him for a second. He’s still not moving.

You wonder if he could be dead, if squid man could have managed to get him. Something tightens in your chest with that thought, but it seems hardly possible to you. Bug man is fast, fast and very hard to catch, what with being annoyingly agile and throwing his sticky webs on everything.

You recall squid man saying something about the gas that filled the factory, and how it was supposed to have knocked you out. Neurotoxins, he said. Puny Banner knows that word, and there’s nothing good about it. Maybe squid man _did_ find a way to make bug man fall asleep long enough to do bad things to him.

Luckily, the gas didn’t work on you. But then again, what was the last time such a cheap trick worked on the Hulk?

You kneel next to your friend and an unpleasant feeling floods you. It’s not anger, it’s…something _else_. You grab the back of bug man’s head in one of your clumsy big hands, lifting it up as gently as you can. With your other hand, you pinch his mask between two of your fingers and you very, very carefully peel it off.

You recognize the face underneath, the youthful features and the brown bangs. It’s not an impostor in red and blue suit. It’s really bug man – Peter. Blood is trickling across his face from a cut on his forehead, from his nose and from the corner of his mouth.

You’re a little perplexed. You’ve never seen bug man bleed. He’s solid – you’ve thrown him around quite a bit yourself without putting as much as a scratch on him. That must have been the fault of squid man’s gas.

He was definitely not playing fair if he needed to put bug man to sleep to catch him. To…hurt him.

You clench your teeth hard. You are beside yourself that squid man could have dared to use such cowardly tactics to hurt the only friend you have in this world. You are going to go back to squid man’s brick box and crush him for this. _Crush him_. You can’t leave now, but in that moment, you swear you’ll find him as soon as you have the chance, and make him _pay_.

Then, all of a sudden, you hear a faint sound coming from your friend. It’s a small, dim, pained sound. Like…a whimper. Bug man is stirring. It eases you in a substantial way to at least be certain that he isn’t dead. Finally, he opens his blue eyes and looks around confusedly.

The first thing he does is wipe his face with his arm. He doesn’t notice how it comes back bloody because of his red glove.

"Ow, I’ve really got a monster headache."

A split second later, he notices you, eyes widening in both fear and surprise momentarily, and then adds:

"…No offense. What are you doing here, big guy?"

"Hulk get bug man from squid man’s secret metal house. Hulk is gonna go smash him good."

"Squid? Hey, he’s not a squid, he’s an octopus. Doctor Octopus, to be more specific. And no smashing Doc Ock will take place without your friendly neighbourhood Spider-man."

Bug man tries to sit up, but finds himself unable to do so and falls back onto the roof with a groan and a weak laugh.

"Ouch. I think it’s fair to say that this spider has been _squashed_."

He reaches for your arm and grabs it to pull himself back on his feet. Normally, you’re not keen on being touched, but you make an exception because your friend is clearly in need of assistance here.

Something’s wrong though. Bug man’s grip is shaky and uncertain, and the second he’s back up, he yells in pain and his legs give way under him. He collapses on all fours, grasping at his chest while he gags and retches and coughs uncontrollably. Blood gushes from his mouth and splatters onto the roof, vivid red on the dull gray concrete. Bug man sees it this time.

"Oh boy. That can’t be…good…"

The rest of his sentence trails off as his eyeballs roll into their sockets and his body falls limp again.

"Bug man!"

You start to seriously panic. He is much more hurt than you thought. He seemed relatively intact, but it seems like he has wounds on the _inside_. And they seem seriously bad.

You recognize the feeling that is now filling you to the brim, and you’re distressed at how different it feels from the usual anger. It’s worry. You’re worried sick.

It bears repeating: bug man may very well be the only friend you have in the whole world, and now he’s lying on a roof in New York, knocked out cold, face bloody. You don’t have the slightest notion of what you should do. For the first time since your last transformation, you briefly wish you could be the other guy right now.

Puny Banner is weak and small, but with his big brain, he could have handled this. Banner could have fixed what’s broken in bug man. Make him well again.

That is a pious wish, however, since bringing back Banner is also pretty high on the list of the things you currently have no clue how to do. If you could have done it right now, you absolutely would have, even if it meant Banner would have done everything to ensure you never took the reins again. That would have been a small price to pay if it meant making bug man all right again.

But ever since your last transformation, you haven’t turned back into the puny other guy, not once. It seems you are the Hulk now. That is who you are. That also means that in this instant, it’s up to you to help bug man. Not Banner. You. 

You are right there in your cogitations when the sound of broken glass reaches your ears from below. You peer over the edge of the skyscraper, looking for the origin of the sound. It’s squid man! Scaling the façade using only his clawed tentacles, he shouts at you aggressively.

"I won’t let you steal my prize!"

You go against your every instinct and refrain from jumping off the roof to body slam squid man into oblivion. You know it’s not you he’s after, and you’re afraid that if you step away from bug man even one second, squid man or his robots will finish what they started. You squeeze your noggin between your hands, groaning in frustration. You have to do something, and you have to do it quick.

You remember, not so long ago, feeling sick after fighting the metal space creatures and waking up in a little bed in a room with a stupidly low ceiling. You were in bug man’s home; he had brought you there while you were out like a light. You didn’t really like that house – too small, bad food – but you can still hear the words he had said when you tried to escape through the window: "You can’t leave because I’m your friend, and I'm looking for a way to help you feel better, and I need a little time for that".

Time…yes. Time is what you need. You need time so you can come up with a better solution (or, actually, any solution at all) so you’re going to take bug man to your home, or what passes for your home these days, and figure something out.

It’s the only option that seems to be available to you right now, so you roll with it. You crouch besides bug man and cautiously scoop him up, taking worlds of precaution to avoid damaging him any further.

When the puny squid man reaches the roof, you are both long gone already, leaving him alone to wail in rage to the night sky.

*** 

Obviously, you don’t take bug man to your last hiding place - that would have been just _dumb_. The New York City sewers form a huge, sprawling underground network; you know you can find shelter somewhere else.

It takes you forever to find a new spot, but you finally manage to locate an empty water filtration tank that looks sort of safe. A hole has been blasted in its wall, creating some sort of entryway.

It’s not quite big enough to house the two of you – you barely fit in there yourself, sitting and with your gigantic shoulders hunched. You have to settle with keeping bug man in your arms, since there is definitely no place for you to set him down on the floor.

Now that you’ve found shelter, you feel a little calmer. You look at bug man’s bloodied face reluctantly. You really, really don’t like seeing your friend like this. It does bad things to your insides, like the time you tried to see how many rocks you could swallow before getting a stomach-ache. You clutch him a little closer to your chest.

Bug man is a tough nut to crack, but…it seems he’s been cracked this time. He’s shivering now, in long rolling waves, which makes him feel odd in your arms – fragile, like you could snap each bone in his body in a half-instant of inattention. That just makes you more careful, and you focus on handling your friend with all the restraint you can muster. Like he’s precious, but damaged, which is exactly what he is to you right now.

His breathing is ragged and heavy, each inhalation accompanied by a deeply unpleasant hoarse sound. Every once in a while, his whole body tenses like a bowstring and he coughs up more blood.

You try wiping it off his face, but very soon, you have so much on your own green hands that you end up just smearing it around. The worry that’s been tying your innards in a knot is slowly being replaced by a sinking sense of dread. It’s starting to be obvious that whatever’s wrong with bug man isn’t going to just go away.

He needs a hospital. He needs a doctor. You’re hesitating, however, because if you bring him to one, you know he will have to kiss his secret identity goodbye, and although you don’t fully understand why, you know that bug man cares a great deal about making sure no one knows he is Peter Parker under his mask.

You don’t want to mess up here. You wish bug man would wake up long enough to tell you what to do.

 "Bug man, wake up!"

It’s no use, however, as no amount of calling his name makes him come around.  You actually quickly regret your attempt at waking up bug man, since your bellowing in the echo-filled sewers appears to have been noticed. All of a sudden, you hear footsteps and hushed voices in the distance and go perfectly still as they grow closer and closer.

"I’m telling you I heard something this way."

"And I’m telling you no way, White Tiger. You got cat litter in your ears or something?"

"Good job, you two. If there is really something out there, now it knows we’re coming."

"Power Man is right. Subtlety is to strategy what wings are to a bird."

"…Come again, Iron Fist?".

 "I mean we can’t have a plan if we’re the ones being surprised, Nova."

"Riiiight, I got that."

They’re just around the corner now. It’s too late to try leaving. You retreat into the darkness as much as you can. There is no way they’re going to see you, right?

Through the hole in the empty water tank’s wall, you see four people in bright costumes pass you by, bickering. There is a girl in a white get-up reminding you of a cat, a man in a green suit sporting a dragon symbol on his chest, and another man in a yellow and black outfit with sunglasses. The fourth one is flying, glowing like a light bulb. You hold your breath. You don’t think they’ve noticed you.

Then, in your arms, bug man _coughs_.

In a perfectly synchronized reaction, the four turn towards you, and when their senses parse what they’re seeing, their faces contort in various expressions of incomprehension and terror.

"The Hulk? asks light bulb man. Weren’t we following Webhead’s signal?"

You sit there, dumbfounded. What do you do now?

"Look! yells white cat lady. Is that…Spidey?"

She covers her mouth with her clawed hands, horrified, as her companions finally notice the guy in the red and blue suit that you’re cradling. Do they know bug man? It would seem like it, because when sunglasses man speaks, he sounds like his very world is shattering.

"Oh my God…Peter…is he…"

"What did you do to him, you green _freak_?" barks light bulb man.

"No! It wasn’t Hulk!" you shout right back.

You can almost see it when light bulb man snaps, anger overcoming reason – that’s something you experience on a daily basis. Yelling indistinctly, he raises his hands and blasts you with all the light he’s got to spare. It doesn’t hurt much – more like _tickles you_ , actually - but you’re worried that bug man will be caught in the blast, and in his current state, you don’t know what it would do to him.

"Ki-yah!"

His fist shining with a yellow flame, dragon man sprints towards you. This is bothersome. You can’t fight him or any of them right now. You have to take care of bug man. Not letting go of your injured payload, you jump out of the water tank, and you take off running as rays of blue light crash into your bulky back.

"After him! He’s got Webs!" yells white cat lady.

You zigzag through the sewers, trying to distance your pursuers through the maze-like network of pipes, but they’re good, they manage to stay on your heels like they know exactly where you are going. You want to get out. Now.

You turn a few other corners and finally spot a maintenance hatch on your right. Grabbing the crank, you just tear the door off its hinges and throw it behind you. It lands into sunglasses man, making him fall down with a grunt, but he’s back on his feet a second later.

***

You jump out the hatch and find yourself in a water filtration plant crawling with puny humans in white coats and yellow hats. They point at you and flee for their lives, screaming.

Single-minded, you disregard them and charge towards the nearest wall, which makes way for you in a concert of splintered wood and smashed bricks.

You’re finally outside. The four costumed ones are still trailing you as you run through the plant’s exterior ward, past several huge cylindrical water pools. You’re starting to wonder if they’re going to give up chasing you any time soon when you hear a loud droning sound coming from above.

You look up and are pretty astonished to see the sky ship from not so long ago darken the skies. Whirring all around it are various flying machines filled with humans wearing black vests and helmets, pointing guns at you.

A huge, impressively armoured flying machine lands in front of you and out of it comes eye patch man, looking even sterner than you recall.

Finally, you stop running. Behind you, the four costumed ones come to a stop as well and assume a guarding stance.

"Hulk", says eye patch man as he walks towards you. "Hand Spiderman over to us right now. He needs medical attention immediately."

 "Hulk tried to tell the costumed ones that Hulk didn’t do it. Squid man do it. Squid man hurt bug man!"

Eye patch man frowns ominously.

"That doesn’t matter at the moment. If Spiderman is really your friend, you’ll give him to us. We’ve been monitoring his vitals ever since you got him out of range of Octavius’ jamming devices, and if we don’t do something _right now_ , he’ll die."

You didn’t quite get everything he said, but what certainly got through to you was the part where eye patch man said bug man was going to die.

It feels like your heart stops for a second. You grip bug man, look at him, then look at eye patch man. Worry, anger, fear and despair all mingle in your chest confusingly.

The people in the sky ship hurt you before, but bug man trusts them, and you understand thanks to what vague knowledge you have of Banner’s expertise that they have some fine medical equipment in there.

You close your eyes, clamp your teeth and nod slowly.

"Hulk give bug man to eye patch man."

Eye patch man immediately waves at another flying machine, which lands a little away from the other one. Several humans unload stretchers and medical equipment from the vehicle and bring them over to you. Gently, you lay bug man down on the stretchers, trying your best not to do any abrupt movements. Immediately, the puny humans strap him onto it and hurry him away.

You turn towards eye patch man, stepping close to him until only inches separate your two faces. You stare him right in his single eye with all the fury and menace you can muster. He doesn’t flinch.

"Hulk comes too. Hulk not gonna let the sky people hurt bug man."

Eye patch man nods, and you follow him back to his flying machine.

*** 

"How long do you think it’ll take before Webs wakes up?"

The four costumed ones are visiting bug man in the medical facility where he is recovering. They aren’t wearing their costumes at the moment, however. The one who asked this question is white cat lady, although she doesn’t look anything like a cat right now. She and all the others all look like normal puny humans.

"I’m sure he’s just making us wait to punish us for not listening to him", jokes the short, tan youngster that you know is actually light bulb man.

"Patience is the virtue of the wise", adds dragon man, who is actually a young man with blonde hair long enough to reach his broad shoulders.

An uncomfortable silence falls upon the group as they all direct their attention towards bug man.

It’s been a few days since eye patch man brought you two on board of the sky ship. Bug man hasn’t woken up since. You’re certain of it, because you hardly left his side during the whole time.

At first, your presence in the medical facility caused a bit of a ruckus, as you knocked over things by accident and were a general nuisance in your attempts to help. However, when the white coat people threatened to have you taken away and locked up if you didn’t behave, you simmered down quite a bit.

You’re afraid bug man will die while you’re gone, all alone, so you do what it takes to stay by his side. You’ve never been so calm.

Bug man is now lying in a hospital bed, hooked up to several machines that hum and beep and blink without interruption. A plastic mask connected to a tube covers his nose and mouth, and a small bandage was applied to the cut on his forehead.

One of the white coat people tried explaining to you what happened to bug man. She even showed you pictures of bug man’s insides. The recollection you have of Banner’s science skills allowed to get the gist of it: as he was being sedated by the gas, bug man trashed around and resisted, so squid man tried to knock him out by throwing him around to prevent him from getting away. The repeated impacts broke some of his ribs.

Apparently, bug man had gotten broken ribs quite often before, and it’s usually not so bad, but this time, he fell unconscious during the beating because of the gas, so he couldn’t stop squid man from causing him more injuries. Pieces of broken bone had been driven into his lungs and oesophagus, puncturing them, which is why he was coughing up blood and breathing with extreme difficulty.

To fix that, they carved up bug man and did a bunch of things to his organs before putting him back together again. You didn’t like that one bit, but you know it was necessary.

Aside from that, the four costumed ones finally ended up believing that squid man had done this to him, not you. As soon as bug man had been evacuated safely, eye patch man had sent them to squid man’s lair alongside you to arrest him, but he was gone.

At least, you did get to smash the lab to rubble. White cat lady managed to get a sample of the gas, which proved to be a substance created using bug man’s DNA to weaken people and put them to sleep.

That, and the fact that you were watching over your friend like an overzealous watch dog, was proof enough for the costumed ones that you were all on the same side. You sort of get how they could have been mistaken at first, seeing you with bug man’s blood all over your hands, hiding his broken body in the sewers.

You don’t exactly have the reputation of a gentle giant.

Now, time is just going by peacefully. Bug man is slowly recuperating, still not quite back among the living. The four costumed ones leave his side from time to time to take care of other matters, but you stay with him.

They come back as soon as they can every day, talking, reading and playing games with you. Waiting.

***

About three days after the incident, you are playing a game of cards with the costumed ones (or rather, they are playing, and you are trying not to crush your cards) when bug man finally starts moving again.

In a second, the five of you are crowded around his bed, but white coat people hurry over and shoo you away – they manage to make the costumed ones step back, but they give up when your turn comes. There is no making the Hulk step aside if he doesn’t want to.

Groaning softly, bug man opens his eyes. For a few seconds, he stares straight at you without seeing you, which freaks you out at first.

"Where…what…"

He blinks as he appears to remember what happened, and, soon enough, recognition dawns upon his face.

"Hey there, pal. Long-time no see", he says to you, cracking a smile.

The four costumed ones hurry back to the bed upon hearing bug man’s voice, pushing aside the white coat people who roll they eyes to the heavens.

"Webhead! You took your sweet old time, didn’t you?" teases light bulb man.

 "Anything to have to endure your presence a little less, Buckethead."

They all laugh, relieved. It’s all okay. Finally, they can rest easy. Bug man is going to be alright. A moment of silence comes and goes, but for the first time in days, it’s a pleasant, reassuring space that no one feels the need to immediately fill.

"Listen", starts white cat lady, suddenly serious. "The team and I, we wanted to apologize".

"What for?" asks bug man, smirking. "I mean, I’m sure I can find something if you give me a minute, but what in particular?"

Bug man is doing his best to act normal now that he’s awake, but his face is still pale, and it’s obvious the conversation is draining what little energy he has.

"We should have listened to you when you warned us about those octobots", answers the now sunglasses-less sunglasses man. "You were right when you said they were tougher than they looked. It’s only because they whooped our asses that they were able to get you."

Dragon suit man nods, repentant.

"We’re a team. We’re supposed to have your back, and we didn’t come through. And because of that, you almost…"

"What are you going to say, Danny, died?" bug man interrupts with a chuckle. "Dude, Doc Ock has got nothing on me. It’s okay. I’m fine now."

"No, you’re not", snaps white cat lady right back. "Drop the act for a second and realize that if it hadn’t been for the Hulk, _yes_ , you would have _died_. And it would have been on us, because we didn’t listen to you. Now be a good leader and accept our apology."

Bug man is rendered speechless. That’s a rare occasion, but to be fair, he isn’t exactly in top condition right now.

"Aw, shucks, he answers, smiling. I guess you guys really do care…Alright. I accept your apology. And I guess this spider also owes some big thanks to his friend the Hulk."

 The five of them look at you.

 "We all owe a great debt to the Hulk", says dragon suit man, looking at you solemnly. "He saved our friend’s life."

Bug man smiles at you and nods.

"I’d high five you if my arms weren’t chock-full of needles right now, big guy. Thanks."

"Bug man take care of Hulk, so Hulk take care of bug man."

He laughs, and weakly, he lifts his hand up to give you a handshake. You seize it gently. When you let go of his hand, bug man is surprised to see that it didn’t hurt. He giggles a little.

"Wow, did S.H.I.E.L.D. really develop a handshake filter for you?"

You shake your head.

"No. Hulk learn to be careful."

***

 A few days later, you leave the sky ship. Bug man hasn’t fully recovered yet, but he can now walk a little and appears to be on the fast track to becoming his healthy bug self again.

You don’t think he needs you around anymore, even if he did insist that you stay – you know he’s trying to get you to give the white coat people another chance, but you’re really not ready to do that. Not yet. Plus, bug man has his other friends, the four costumed ones, and you really don’t like the sky ship – he’ll be just fine.

So, you leave, but this time, you don’t smash the ship, and you don’t jump into the ocean – eye patch man has you escorted to the location of your choosing in one of his big flying machines.

When you’re about to leave, he stops you for a second.

"Hulk. You know we’ll be keeping an eye on you. So be careful."

"No, you sneer. You be careful. Hulk keep eye on you!"

And with that, you leap into the distance, quickly becoming nothing but a small green dot in eye patch man’s vision.

There is no time to waste. You have a squid man to find – and smash.


End file.
